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31/08/2022 In Sermons & Services

Sermon for the 12th Sunday after Trinity – 4th September 2022: Deuteronomy 30, 15-end.

Fr Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens

 

‘See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity’. (Deut 30, 15). These are stark choices – it is difficult to get more polarity than this.

We do seem to be living in times of great polarity – in Pakistan devastating floods, and in parts of Africa murderous drought. Wild fires seem to be in the news alongside melting glaciers, burgeoning population growth alongside food shortage and issues of sustainability. It looks like an Earth in something of a crisis just as America sends a rocket to the moon so that a station can be set up form which travel will become possible to Mars. Isn’t this just what the planets need? Humans!

Global catastrophes are called ‘apocalyptic’ or ‘of biblical proportions.’

No one nowadays is unaware of the issues facing the world and her populations; no-one is unconscious of environmental challenges, or the effects of global warming – even though some choose to deny it. I don’t and I’m sure you don’t – even though we must exercise some caution about ‘global warming’ being the default position for everything that goes wrong. You know what I mean.

Environmental change is on everyone’s lips but not in the change of most of our lifestyles. There is little real commitment to radical choice change. We expect to switch on our lights; we assume that there will be fuel for our cars; we are disappointed when we can’t get what we want in a supermarket; and all of this as cheaply as possible, no matter what the impact is in our consumption of oil, electricity, food. We are hearing daily, or seeing on the news, things that challenge us, but it seems we don’t quite have the language to express how we want to change, or how we feel sorry for what we are doing to the planet. I would propose that as Christians we can supply some of the powerful language that the world seems to need.

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29/08/2022 In Sermons & Services

ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY, 28th August 2022: PROVERBS 25:6-7, HEBREWS 13:1-8,15-16, LUKE 14 :1,7-14

Deacon Chris Saccali – St Paul’s Athens

THE INVITATION

I speak in the name of the Triune God Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

It was the invitations that were NOT issued that were the issue; it often is if you think about it, people get miffed if they are not invited to an event. I am speaking, in this instance, about the Lambeth Conference which took place in Canterbury from July 24th until 7th August. This gathering of Anglican Bishops from across the Communion , their spouses and observers last took place in 2008 and was postponed in 2018 then interrupted by COVID. 

This time there were over 650 Bishops and many more women than in 2008 made up that number. They were invited – the problem for many lay in the word spouse if the Bishop was in a same sex relationship; this caused quite a brouhaha as I Before the Lambeth Conference when we were asked to pray, I did just that – asked people to pray. A nasty comment was posted about the spouses NOT invited from the LGBTQ + community from a member of it who is a priest in our diocese. I did not react because I do not relish conflict but I do know it is impossible to avoid it especially in church.  Jesus was always right there teaching in the midst of conflict, at the centre and heart of it although I am not sure of his tweets and posts. Last week’s gospel reading and today’s echo his reaction to conflict.

However, social media is not the place to get irate or aerated while hiding behind postings. The Lambeth Conference, despite all the negative hype intended to hijack it, was a real blessing to the attendees and a time filled with the Holy Spirit and the unexpected presence of God. Listen to Bishops Robert and David talking about it on the Diocesan website. There are also other astute clips on most Diocesan websites including Norwich which I have found helpful. 

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18/08/2022 In Sermons & Services

Sermon for the 10th Sundy after Terinity – 21st August 2022:Is 58, 9-end; Hebrews 12, 18-end; Luke 13, 10-17

Fr Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens

One of the responsibilities set before a preacher is that of enlightening the hearers: this may be done in a number of ways, and sometimes in more than one way within the same sermon. There is the expository sermon – one in which the preacher looks carefully at the text of one of the scripture readings. There is the exhortatory sermon – one in which the texts or the common theme is crafted to encourage people in their faith and daily life; the sermon might be entirely or partly didactic – that is a focus on straightforward teaching, about the church’s history or dogmatics.

Other styles of preaching exist, of course, and all sermons can use illustrations from literature, humour, or human examples of goodness or indeed of sadness. Preaching is a rich environment for enabling the flourishing of themes, subjects, and styles. Normally though the preacher will feel the need to leave some questions answered, and a congregation will so often want to be more certain after hearing a sermon preached.

Well that’s all very fine and dandy. However, I ask the question, is there some room in the preacher’s annual schedule simply to place before a congregation some dilemmas, antitheses, opposites – simply naming them but without the contortions of supplying a solution?

If this is one of the legitimate purposes of a preacher, then we can approach today’s scripture readings, observing the dilemmas they provide us with – and not seek to give an answer.

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12/08/2022 In Sermons & Services

Sermon for the Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary – 14th August 2022

Fr Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens

The 15th August (tomorrow) is the universal date on which the church celebrates the Blessed Virgin Mary. This celebration is kept by the Orthodox, Catholic and Anglican traditions.

On this date the Orthodox speak of the Eternal Sleep of the Mother of God, and Blessed Mary is referred to in Orthodoxy as Panaghia – (All holy). The Roman Church celebrates what they now call the Assumption, a dogma that is barely 200 years old as currently understood, and a dogma which does not rest at all comfortably with Anglican theology, and may be a major cause for Anglicans to be ‘cautious’ about absorbing Mary into a theological system. In Greece the 15th August is always a public holiday.

The Anglican tradition is more akin to the East than to Rome, and for centuries since the Reformation we have commemorated the Dormition, the ‘falling asleep’ of the BVM on this date.

Blessed Mary is the human mother of the incarnate Jesus, the fully human Jesus. We must remember however that in Christian theology this same Jesus is also fully divine, so Mary is indeed the mother of Jesus as the bible witnesses, but at the same time, the Church accords her the exalted title of Mother of God, since Jesus of Nazareth is both fully human and fully divine. Her title is agreed in the ancient Councils of the church as Theotokos – God-Bearer, a title that emerges from the seriously dangerous debates in the 4th and 5th centuries concerning the humanity and divinity of Christ. Her title makes Blessed Mary a ‘protectress’ of the of the human-divine Jesus.

It is on account of this that Blessed Mary is worthy of the titles ascribed to her by the Church. So she is indeed Panaghia (All Holy One) in all three traditions, even if only the Orthodox use this distinctive Greek word.

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02/08/2022 In Sermons & Services

Sermon for the 7th Sunday after Trinity, St Ignatius – 31st July 2022: ECCLESTIASTES 1:2-12,2:18-2, LUKE 12:13-21

Deacon Christine Saccali – St Paul’s Athens

It is the height of summer here now – August tomorrow and I hope you have had or will have a break or a staycation as the fashionable phrase goes. But the real question is, I feel, is whether we have been able to take time out of our hectic schedules to spend time with the King, as the hype for the Elvis film goes but we are talking about the king of our hearts and souls – Jesus.

But carving out time, even on holiday or on leave to be with God isn’t always as simple as that, I find. I don’t know about you but it takes me two or three days to unwind and leave all the day to day stuff behind that nags away at one. Then I have to still my soul and listen out above the tumult and clamour of life for that small voice. By the time, I am in the position to listen then it can be time to come home again.

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15/07/2022 In Sermons & Services

Sermon for the 5th Sunday after Trinity – 17th July 2022: Genesis 18, 1-10a; Col 1, 15-28; Lk 10, 38-end.

Fr Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens

Last Sunday we had a lovely party in the church garden to welcome back some special visitors. It was a most pleasant event, and comes on top of a series of social gatherings such as the Jubilee Bazaar, and the brunch we all enjoyed after the liturgy in June when we celebrated St. Peter and Paul, since Paul is our patron by dedication of the church.

We are all grateful to the team that so smoothly and graciously ensure that these events go without any problems. We are richly blessed by them – as we are by the generous giving of time, and finances, and energy in every aspect of our congregational life together. Where would we be if we were not willing to work for things that matter, and it is intrinsic in our baptism that we assume the responsibility of being co-workers with Christ, in his mission to transform God’s world. The two words that perhaps sum up what we do are ‘worship and work’. One of the key characteristics that conjoins the two is ‘hospitality’.

Many years ago the bishop in a diocese where I worked said, ‘God doesn’t need a building to live in – he needs somewhere to show his hospitality.’ Church life is an expression of and an attempt to share with others, the hospitality of God.

All are invited, all are included

All are made welcome, none are excluded

This is the table of Christ

Come if you’re young, come if you’re old

Come if you’re broken, come if you’re whole

Come if you’re weary of the trials of life

This is the table of Christ.

 

Jesus the host washes your feet

makes you his guest and lays on a feast.

This is the table of Christ,

come if you’re rich, come if you’re poor,

come if the church stops you at the door,

come and eat bread, come and drink wine.

This is the table of Christ.

 

Eat and remember Jesus the one

Who gave up his life so you could belong,

This is the table of Christ.

Come if you’re thirsty, come and be filled

Come and be clean, come and be healed

Come and be held in the presence of God.

This is the table of Christ.

 (Words by Jonny Baker, taken from the book: ‘The Hospitality of God’ by Michael Perham)

Hospitality is the characteristic of the Old Testament reading this morning. The episode in the life of Abraham is the inspiration for the very famous icon of the Russian iconogropher Rublev. In this encounter between Abraham and the angels, and influenced by Rublev’s interpretation many see a foreshadowing of the Holy Trinity, positioned in such a way, gathered around a table with food, that seems to invite us to join the life this Trinity, and to share in the real and spiritual food of life with the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit. Many pages of words have been spent on the interpretations of the icon – and you will either find the hermeneutics of the icon by different people compelling and persuasive, or tenuous, speculative and over emphasized. I have to say, I have never liked the icon, (there are many Byzantine examples that are better) and I am indifferent to some of the interpretations of it, as it rather obscures the beauty of the scripture.

Let’s concentrate on that. Abraham, encounters three angels or divine beings as he sits at the entrance of his tent by the oaks of Mamre. His first reaction is one of worship. He recognizes an epiphany of the divine, so what else can a human being do? He bows down in the divine presence, and greets the manifestation with the title ‘Lord’. In the scriptural tradition all such manifestations, such as the Archangel Gabriel’s appearance to Blessed Mary are considered to be as if God was present.

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